THE US Defence Secretary James Mattis was not wrong on Sunday to warn Kim Jong-un that any attack on the US or its allies would be met with a “massive military response”.

While Mattis didn’t specifically mention nuclear weapons, and reassured the world that the Trump administration is not “looking to the total annihilation” of North Korea, it should be clear to the North Korean leader that if he ever fires a nuclear weapon in anger it will be responded to in kind.

The US would not and should not pussyfoot around – it would have a duty to put North Korea beyond any further threat.

This said, it would be a massive failure on the part of the Trump administration, as well as the governments of China, Russia and the rest of the world, if Kim Jong-un’s aggression was allowed to lead to such a catastrophic outcome.

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The outside world has the means to clip Kim Jong-un’s wings now, before it is too late.

However, this requires China to take a leading role. North Korea may often give the impression of being hermetically sealed from the outside world yet in reality it is far from self-sufficient.

It is reliant on imports for all its oil, as well as being dependent on food aid. Like almost every other nation which experimented with communism, North Korea’s military grandstanding contrasts somewhat poorly with its ability to feed its own people.

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According to a UN report earlier this year 40 per cent of North Koreans are under-nourished – in spite of food donated by the outside world.

Donors include not just the US but Britain, too. Bizarrely, while Kim Jong-un has been threatening to rain missiles down on the West we have been helping feed his people to the tune of £4million over the past six years.

But it is China which has by far the strongest economic relationship with North Korea. As well as food, China exports petrol, diesel and crude oil to the country. In return it imports coal, iron ore and textiles.

In April, China did belatedly make a start in imposing sanctions against the regime by banning coal imports until the end of the year. In June, China’s National Petroleum Corporation followed it up with a temporary ban on selling petrol and diesel to North Korea – although it seemed to be motivated more by a fear of not being paid.

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North Korea has been warned against a nuclear attack on the US or its allies

This, however, excluded the much greater quantity of crude oil which China exports to North Korea via a pipeline.

If China wanted to cut off the lifeblood of Kim Jong-un’s military machine it could do so at a stroke, by cutting off the pipeline.

You cannot fly aeroplanes, fire missiles or run a modern army without oil. Deprived of fuel, North Korea’s armed forces would grind to a halt in days. There would be no more firing missiles, no more nuclear tests.

Kim Jong-un’s secret republic would be back to the steam age. China, it seems, is reluctant to do anything to undermine North Korea because it fears that if the current regime were to fall North Korea might, like East Germany at the end of the Cold War, be reunited with its much wealthier, US-orientated neighbour. It fears doing anything which might lead indirectly to the US gaining more power in the region.

On this, Donald Trump should be able to give assurances. While he can’t rule out North Korea one day joining the south – that is a matter for the Koreans themselves to determine – he could guarantee not to station US forces or weapons in North Korea in the event of the current regime crumbling.

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US President Donald Trump has threatened North Korea with military action

There would be no need to do this anyway – the US forces currently stationed in South Korea are there principally to defend that country.

Were the threat from Pyongyang to recede there would be no need to extend this force. Within living memory China was itself an insular country where the government ruled through fear and living standards for ordinary people stood in almost comic contrast to the military might it liked to show to the outside world.

It is hardly a democracy now, and has a long way to go until it can claim a human rights record of Western standards. It would be hard to deny, though, that China is a vastly better place than it was in 1989 when the army opened fire on protesters in Tiananmen Square in Beijing.

It has opened its economy to the world, raised the living standards of its people and on human rights is at least moving in the right direction. But if it wants to show its maturity as a world power it now has a huge opportunity.

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If it can defuse the North Korean situation before it can escalate into war it will hugely enhance its reputation. At the moment, however, all the running is being left to the US. Like or loathe Donald Trump, he is the one who has been left to remind Kim Jongun of the serious consequences of developing nuclear weapons and using them to threaten neighbours.

It would be far better for the world if the lead was taken instead by Xi Jinping. It isn’t the Chinese leader’s style to fire off tweets at 3am – and his government is none the worse for that.

But the world is listening intently to China for a loud, clear and punishing response to the latest nuclear test. The sooner it comes, the better.